


In Ten Ways, We Know Each Other (or perhaps just myself)

by hotrodngold (Krystalicekitsu)



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Gen, Headcanon, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-31
Updated: 2012-08-31
Packaged: 2017-11-13 06:41:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/500608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krystalicekitsu/pseuds/hotrodngold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Clint hates Coulson (No, really), discovers a weakness for apple fritters, drinks cheep beer with Tony, and Steve speaks English. Only not really.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Ten Ways, We Know Each Other (or perhaps just myself)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on [my tumblr](http://hotrodngold.tumblr.com/post/30066886853/10-headcanons-for-clint-barton-and-the-hawk)\- cleaned up and imported here.

**He feels twitchy on the ground- especially if there are tall/taller buildings around.**

Maybe it's a leftover from the circus, maybe it's just a 'line of sight' thing, but the back of his neck hums if he knows there's the opportunity to be higher up than everyone else and he isn't taking it.

Being higher up gives him clarity, gives him insight and the peace of mind to think things out. It's safer being so far removed from everyone, and up in the air, watching people below scurry about, he feels like the falling has stopped and he's finally flying.

**Watching Selvig and the Tesseract was to be his first solo mission.**

He and Coulson- the senior agent and his handler up til then- had discussed the merits of a tactical op versus an oversight assignment for days- weeks, if Clint was being honest. They'd weighted the pros and cons, sometimes with a stifling, sharp hostility, but always with words and reason and logic- because that's the only way you talked with Coulson.

So when Clint pressed and pressed and pressed some more, he had to answer when Coulson finally turned around and questioned _him_.

"Why don't you want to lead a tactical op, Barton?"

He had no idea how to reply because 'I don't want to be responsible for sending someone to their death if I screw up' sounded maudlin and self-depreciating no matter how he phrased it in his head.

**Clint Barton was completely prepared to shoot the Black Widow.**

They were staring each other down, both guns nearly empty, when Clint flicked on the safety to his handler's confusion- and increasingly irritated requests for a status report over the com in his ear. He held out a hand to the downed Widow, holstered his gun, and hauled her to her bemused feet.

He took her out for gelato, turned off the voice in his head that said the voice in his ear might be right, and filled her in on what she could expect- generally- if she decided to join up.

No one, not even the Widow herself, knows that the first time he had her in his sights, it wasn't the sight of her bent weeping over a child's body that stilled his fingers.

It was the consuming guilt and the knife-quick anger in her eyes.

**Clint will never, ever drink beer from a bottle. Or wine from anything other than a box.**

He can still hear the bottles shattering, sometimes, in the quiet moments of hushed hurry up and wait. The shouted 'AGAIN!' and the sharp feeling of skin on skin before he takes a shot.

The feeling of fragmented glass against his back or his side when he wakes late in the day or early in the night.

Beer doesn't taste any different from a can.

**Clint's birthday is something he tries to avoid, because it's the last time he can remember seeing Barney.**

Sometimes... Sometimes, memories are all you get. Sometimes, thinking about things doesn't make it hurt less or hurt more.

It just reminds you what you've _lost_.

**The first time Clint tried pot, he simultaneously decided it was the worst- and the best- thing he'd ever tried.**

Hitting the target wasn't the problem. Caring enough to hit the target? _That_ was the problem, because everything was nice and sort of fuzzy and Bruce and Tony were _hilarious_ and that weird, arm-robot was waving a joint about like some weird 40's movie character and Clint. Could. Not. Stop. Laughing.

So, really.

He's surprised he stayed sober enough not to try shooting the Iron Man suit.

**He can't understand Steve.**

Not, you know, literally, because they still spoke English in the 40s, but in general, because he's military- supposedly- and that's kinda like SHIELD, but the guy says things and does things that are so far left field, Clint finds himself wondering if some psych guy could possibly get him a manual.

With illustrations.

But...

But he can sort of understand bits, here and there, and after they get over the awkward 'you tried to kill me because I tried to kill you because I was brainwashed'...thing, he understood why.

Because Clint's been there- not quite sure where he fits in, not quite sure _if_ he fits in, if there's a place for him here, and it's all so _different_ from what he's used to, so strange and yet familiar, a group dissimilar enough to be similarly recognizable as society's outcasts, the fringe the 'where the hell do we put _you_ ' the last picked in dodgeball.

So, all he's saying is...

Maybe he does understand.

A little.

**He can't stand being alone. He can't stand being with people.**

Sometimes, being alone- or at least not being in the thick of it- is everything. That one moment of peace in a sea of waiting for the next disaster. He needs to be away, to not be immersed in people and people things and relationships and relationship issues. It's less taxing if he doesn't have to respond to someone or acknowledge their existence or pretend to want to interact.

At the same time, the thought of being alone utterly terrifies him.

He's been alone before and alone is-

Alone is no supplies, no back up, bleeding and afraid and hunted, back against the wall with a broken bow string and his last arrow against an enemy he can't perceive or pin down or locate. It's isolation amongst chaos, floating in a kaleidoscope of shifting allegiances. It's always on guard.

It's exhausting.

Sometimes, when these two needs waring inside his head become too much, he drops by Stark Tower- Avengers Tower, though he hasn't said it, probably won't- and uses his access to the subbasement.

He sits there and watches, perched on top of whatever thing is highest and he doesn't get glared at for climbing (though three weeks in, and the second time he drops by, there's a scaffold extended as high as the ceiling will allow that suspiciously never leaves, though it often moves). He'll sit there until the insides of his eyelids stop vibrating, and he can relax into something more like his usual rhythms, sighing and relaxing into the metal frame.

Tony, at one point, will nudge him with a can of very cheap beer, sipping his own, and dangle his feet over the edge, knee brushing gently, reassuringly against Clint's.

They won't talk, but neither one of them needs to.

**He's mildly allergic to apples.**

Not in a life-threatening kind of way, just a gastrointestinal distress sort of way.

Which is really rather sad, because when Coulson inevitably brings around the first 'congrats on not getting dead' post-mission donut box, Clint discovers a secret weakness for apple fritters.

A devastating, unable-to-resist weakness that costs him three groaning hours in the head and a sympathetic but vaguely smirking Coulson who makes a note in his medical file before obligingly offering a whole bottle of Pepito-bismol.

Clint hates the man.

No really.

**He had no idea that Coulson had put his name in for consideration for the Avengers Initiative until months after Coulson's death.**

It shouldn't have taken as long as it did, but what with the clean up, and personal and psych reviews, and then the mandatory time off, it was three months before Clint had a chance to go through his mentor's things.

Not that another agent couldn't have done it- wouldn't have done it- but SHIELD, like any close-knit, militaristic group, had certain inherent superstitions and rituals. This one- an agent's partner going through and selecting which files needed to be closed, which were to be passed on, which mementos to be sent to family and friends and which were too classified- was something that was nearly sacred.

A last chance to say goodbye.

So, when he'd shifted aside a box full of Captain America files and found the one stamped 'AVENGERS INITIATIVE - PROPOSED LINE UP' he had expected to find Cap and maybe Stark and definitely Thor-

He hadn't expected to find Natasha as much, but, he thinks in retrospect, he should've.

He hadn't expected to find another page after the one headed 'BANNER - POSSIBLE CANDIDATE.'

He hadn't expected to find one headed with 'BARTON - PRIME CANDIDATE.'

He hadn't expected to read '...initiative with a strong moral will and a desire for the right actions that will carry the agent above and beyond procedure, into the spirit of command. Would benefit most from a position that allows him to make decisions independent of the chain of command, with a strong support group. Works best when fighting for an ideal with the support that allows him to make decisions that would cripple other agents.'

He hadn't expected to find himself blinking back tears, wishing a ghost would save him from his memories.

But, in retrospect, he should've.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, this is a '10 headcanons' thing. No, I'm not sorry (this was a lot of fun). Yes, these do show up in my fics (though I've not posted them yet).


End file.
